


The Breakfast Club

by someofthissomeofthat11011



Category: Simonverse | Creekwood Series - Becky Albertalli
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-08
Updated: 2020-09-08
Packaged: 2021-03-06 23:48:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 19,547
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26357488
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/someofthissomeofthat11011/pseuds/someofthissomeofthat11011
Summary: Simon and Bram join a “club”. This is written as if Bram never wrote that creeksecrets post.
Relationships: Bram Greenfeld/Simon Spier
Comments: 10
Kudos: 75





	The Breakfast Club

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt by VioletRage: What if they were involved in the same club/ organization?
> 
> *I’m sorry; I know this story doesn’t 100% follow your prompt (really, it’s only your prompt on a technicality), but I hope you like it*
> 
> **There might be another fic coming that more aligns with this prompt if I can consolidate an idea in my head – I have part of an image right now, but not the whole thing **
> 
> ***I’m not making promises, but there might be a second chapter***

“That’s so gay,” Jamie Mitchell says in the middle of Algebra class. We’re supposed to be working on our homework, but as long as we’re not too loud, Mr. Lowe doesn’t usually care what we’re doing. I've been absent mindedly doodling in my notebook while I wait for the bell to ring, but Jamie’s words bring me back to reality.

“Language,” Mr. Lowe calls half-heartedly. I like Mr. Lowe and all (he’s pretty okay for an Algebra teacher), but sometimes I think he’s given up. I get that it can’t be easy teaching us math and that sometimes we’re probably way more than he should have to handle. There’s always someone that giggles whenever the answer to a problem is 69, and I sometimes think I can see his soul leaving his body when someone raises their hand to go to the bathroom instead of volunteering an answer. We ask him about 1000 times a week why we need to learn this stuff (he gives us the same answer every time - we need it to graduate blah blah blah. It's not like we're going to be asked to solve quadratic equations as we walk across the stage to get our diploma). So, yeah. I get that we can be nightmares. But it’s small moments like this where I can practically feel myself retreating into the closet.

Jamie just lowers his voice and repeats to Mike, “that’s so gay.”

“Come on. Mr. Lowe told you to watch it,” I whisper. I glance over at Mr. Lowe and try to act like I’m just looking out for Jamie.

“He can’t hear us. Besides, don’t you think it’s ridiculous that Mike’s parents grounded him for a party he never threw?” Jamie challenges.

“Ridiculous is exactly the word I would use,” I agree. I look at the clock. I would love nothing more than for the second hand to start moving faster. “Maybe stick with that instead of gay.”

“Why? It’s not like anyone in here is gay,” he argues. I shrug. I’m not about to get into an argument over this. The last thing I need is anyone jumping to conclusions. Like, the conclusion that he apparently jumped to. “Unless you’re gay.”

I don’t know what to say to that, so I deflect. “Shouldn’t you be doing homework?” I ask. It was the wrong move. 

“Holy shit. Are you gay?” He kind of has a look on his face like Christmas came early, which is making my stomach churn.

“I’ve had girlfriends,” I remind him. “Why would you think I’m gay?”

“Because you’re getting crazy defensive right now. It’s not a big deal; nobody cares,” Jamie says. Can the bell ring already? “Come on. You can tell me. Tell me. Tell me. Tell me. Tell me. Tell me.” With every word, my frustration grows until I feel like it’s actually clawing out of my chest. Over and over again. He’s relentless. Admittedly, it’s probably partially my fault. Jamie is the kind of kid that likes to push someone’s buttons, and I am probably giving him the reaction he’s looking for.

“Oh my God. No, I’m not. Now shut the fuck up,” I burst. Part of me is angry at Jamie, but the bigger part is angry at myself. I wish I was ready. I wish I could proudly declare that I’m gay, but I’m not there. I’m not ready for anyone else to know. Or I’m just scared. I haven’t figured out if there’s a difference yet.

We sit in the back of the classroom, and I'd be surprised if anyone heard us or cared enough to listen in when we were talking. They certainly heard me when I cussed, so we're getting some confused and surprised looks.

“Simon!” Mr. Lowe says disapprovingly. He closes his book and glares at me as the bell rings. It couldn’t have rung just a minute earlier? “Stay after a minute, would you?” He frames it like a question, but I don’t think I actually have a choice.

I groan and stay in my seat as the rest of my classmates pack up. Once the classroom empties out, I walk over to Mr. Lowe. “I’m really sorry,” I apologize. “Jamie just –”

Mr. Lowe holds up his hand. “I don’t want to hear it. You can’t blame someone else for your actions,” he tells me. That’s freaking ridiculous. That pretty much gives kids a free pass to act shitty. Is anyone gonna yell at Jamie for being an annoying asshole? I don’t think telling him that will help my case, so I firmly keep my mouth shut. “You have detention after school today. I could use some help sorting through the Student Council suggestion box.”

I stifle my groan. “Okay.” My voice barely has any volume. This is actually going to be my first detention ever and it seems really unfair that I’m in trouble and Jamie isn’t. Is what I said really that much worse? I don’t think I ostracize any of my classmates by saying, ‘fuck’.

“I think you’re a good kid, Simon. And you’re better than that.” Ugh. Can he not? He’s putting on a disappointed dad face, and I’m not here for that right now. “You know profanity is against the school code of conduct.”

“But calling something gay is totally fine,” I grumble.

I shouldn’t have said anything. I’m subjected to the most uncomfortable lecture about how two wrongs don’t make a right. And apparently, I should tell him if someone is making me uncomfortable or upset (because obviously Mr. Lowe has a really great track record with that). And he said something about how profanity ruins my teachers’ and peers’ faith in me. Whatever that means. He finishes long after the bell rings. I don’t acknowledge what he said because I think I would only get in more trouble. Instead, I ask, “can I get a pass to my next class?”

Mr. Lowe wordlessly writes me a pass on a post-it note. I’m so late for gym class; I can’t even change because they already locked the locker rooms. It’s okay because I’m still getting credit for class because I have a pass. It’s the only good thing to come out of this. Or so I thought.

I’m late to detention, but Mr. Lowe either doesn’t notice or doesn’t care. He is sitting at his desk with a stack of papers. He must have given a quiz or a test to one of his other classes.

I knock on his door before I walk in. “You can sit wherever you’d like. Read through these. Sort them by common themes. Throw out the ones that are a joke. I’ll be in the workroom grading. I’ll be back in an hour to check on you.” He stands up with his papers, passes me a shoebox, and leaves.

I take a seat in a beanbag chair in the back of the classroom. If I’m stuck here for an hour, there’s no way that I’m sitting at a desk. I lean against the wall, and it’s really one of those divider walls, so it moves a little. It throws me off guard because it makes me feel like I might push it all the way and fall into the other classroom. That’s probably unrealistic, but it freaks me out enough that I sit up instead.

It takes me approximately 5 minutes to sort through the suggestions in the student council box. Most of them are similar. A few of them are obscene. Some seemed to think it was a question box and not a suggestion box. A handful must have been submitted last month because they are suggestions for Halloween and that was almost two weeks ago. One is blank. I’m writing, “I’m bored” over and over again on the blank paper. When there’s no more room, I begin to spin the paper using my pencil’s eraser. I’m apparently really bad at this because it freaking slides right under the divider wall.

I sigh. I guess I could do homework or something. But then I have to open my bag and take out my homework… and then I have to do work. The thought of doing work right now makes me feel like my skin is getting tighter around my chest. My frustration inexplicably starts to bubble, and now, all I can think about is how I could be home, cuddling with Bieber right now, but instead, I’m trapped in detention while Jamie is doing God knows what. It’s just so unfair. Screw Jamie. Figuratively.

I’m pulled from my pity party when a piece of paper slides towards me from the other side of the wall.

**Hi, Bored. It’s nice to meet you.**

I chuckle to myself and write back.

_ My name’s not actually Bored. I’m just so freaking bored right now. _

**I am too. Do you want to play tic tac toe?**

_ Sure. Why not? _

I draw a tic tac toe board and place an O in the middle. I pass it back. I’d thought this was the ultimate way to win, but we end up with a tie. They win the second game. And the third. And we tie the fourth. No matter what I try, I can’t win. When I realize they’re going to win no matter where I put my “O” in the fifth game we play, I’m done. Tic tac toe has lost its appeal.

_ You’re really good at this game. Are you even a student? _

I slip it back and only have to wait a few seconds.

**Yeah. I’m a junior. How about you?**

_ Same! _

I don’t realize until after I slip it under that I probably should have asked them a question. They may not send the note back. I really don’t want to go back to spiraling from boredom. Maybe I should have just started another game of tic tac toe.

Fortunately for me, they send it back.

**What brings you after school today?**

_ I’m being wrongfully imprisoned lol. Not really… well, sort of. I have detention. _

**What are you in for?**

_ I cussed because this asshole wouldn’t leave me alone… I know I’m a freaking criminal. Now I get to spend an hour sorting through the freaking Student Council suggestion box. What are you staying after for? _

**I’m supposed to be tutoring a freshman, but she didn’t show up. I could help you sort through if you want. That actually sounds fun.**

_ Are you sure? It’s just reading through all the stuff kids put in here. It’s boring AF _

**I’m sure. I’d love to do something productive.**

_ Okay. Here’s one. “I believe their should be a Chik-fil-A in the cafeteria. It would provide an alternate to students that thinks school food is ineligible.” _

**Do you think ineligible means inedible?**

_ Probably. What did you think? _

**I’m not the biggest fan of Chick-fil-A. Plus, they spelt Chick like “Chik”, so I don’t think they’re truly invested in the cause. The grammar nerd in me is cringing a little right now. Discard pile?**

Huh. Grammar nerd. I make a mental note to pay more attention to what I send them. As I skim the page, I don’t think I’ve been doing terribly so far.

_ Agreed on all counts. Moving to the discard pile. _

It was already in the discard pile, but I don’t tell them that. We spend the next twenty minutes going back and forth with the suggestions. I’d skimmed them, but now that I’m actually reading through them, some are really interesting.

There’s one about updating the history curriculum to actually include more about Black history, Hispanic history, Native American history, etc. We unanimously agree that it’s a really important idea (though neither of us are sure if the Student Council actually has the power to change the curriculum).

Then there’s one about doing a “diversity showcase” every Friday. They suggest having some kind of display during lunch about famous and impactful people that have contributed to society in some way. Maybe some Fridays could be dedicated to foods from different cultures. I slip it under the wall.

I open my bag and fish out my notebook. Half of my bag seems to fall out in the process, but I’ll deal with that later. We’re out of space on the note we’ve been passing back and forth, so I rip out a piece of paper and write my note on the new page.

_ I really like this one. _

The person with this suggestion had filled both sides of the suggestion slip with their tiny writing, so instead of copying it over, I just send it over with my note. When they send it back, they’ve removed the edge that came out of my notebook, so the page immediately looks cleaner.

**It seems like a really good idea. It’s all about exposure, right? I think this is my favorite so far because it really encompasses all students. They could do a display about different religions, sexual orientations, races, gender, etc.**

_ Exactly. Though, I don’t know how many of our classmates would react to learning about sexual orientation. I feel like they’d turn it into a joke. _

**Yeah, maybe. Except, I wonder if that’s exactly why we should talk about it more. It could make it less of a joke and more real, you know?**

_ You’re not wrong. I sometimes wonder if we talked about this more, if we’d realize maybe there are more kids on our side than we realize. _

__

Their response takes so long to come back, I kind of assume that they had to leave abruptly or something. I start to try to balance my pencil on its uneven eraser to try to make the last thirty minutes of detention go faster.

I think I might have it when the paper is passed back and destroys whatever semblance of balance I’d achieved with my pencil.

I don’t mind.

**On our side?**

My heart is pounding in my chest. I should have read my response more carefully before I slipped the note under the wall. I hadn’t even realized how that could be construed. I don’t know what to say. Do I own it and tell them I’m gay? Do I tell them I meant other people? Do I just stop the conversation now?

My mind is a blank slate that has lost its chalk, so I only write back a single word.

_ Yeah _

In retrospect, it’s less than a minute, but it feels so much longer. I feel like I serve ten detentions before their note is passed back.

**Are you saying you’re gay?**

I bite my lip. What do I do? What do I do? What do I do?

I get up and shut the door. I’m really grateful that the door locks from the inside. At least no one walking by will be able to see me. It makes me feel a little safer and a little bolder. And kind of anonymous. Like, so what if I tell this complete stranger who I am? I can hide out here as long as I need to. No one needs to know it’s me. And maybe it will be proof about whether I’m ready to tell people or whether I’m just scared to. I could see how it feels for someone to know.

_ Would it be a problem if I say yes? _

I pass it back, and I hear a thump in the hallway. I half expect some random kid to try to break into my classroom to accuse me of being gay. That doesn’t happen. Instead, the note is passed back to me.

**No. I don’t know how to say this, but… me too.**

I stare at the note. I don’t know if they’re messing with me, but part of me really wants to believe them. If they’re telling the truth, then this detention may be the best thing that ever happened to me. To have someone I can talk to about this? I didn’t know how badly I wanted that until right now.

_ Seriously? You really are? You’re not just saying that because I let it slip? _

**I’m not messing with you. I promise.**

_ Freaking fuck. How is this even possible? _

**It’s kind of like running into someone you know at Disney World, right?** __

_ Are you saying meeting me is like being at the second most magical place on Earth? Because then yes, yes it is. _

**You’re pretty sure of yourself, huh? What do you mean by second most magical?**

_ The most magical place on Earth is Harry Potter World, of course. _

**Ah. Of course. I take it you’re partial to Harry Potter?**

_ It’s only the freaking greatest story of all time! Have you read the books? _

**Yeah. I do a lot of reading. I don’t think I loved them as much as you did, but I enjoyed them.**

_ Well, 1 – it seems like an indicator of poor judgment that you don’t think Harry Potter is the best. Do you have bad judgment? 2 – if not Harry Potter, what’s your favorite book? _

**Does anyone actually have good judgement? I have a theory that there are just varying levels of bad judgment. I’ve never gotten drunk or smoked or anything like that, but one time in middle school, I ate five full jars of Nutella in one sitting which wasn’t my finest moment. As for your second question, I don’t really know. I’m pretty indecisive about “favorite” things. I feel like they’re constantly changing, so I avoid committing to anything.**

I laugh out loud and then put my hand over my mouth. I don’t know if they can hear me, and I don’t know if I want them to know who I am. On the one hand, it’s essentially risk-free. If anyone can be trusted to keep this secret, it’s someone with the same secret. At the same time, the idea of someone knowing, really and truly knowing, is terrifying.

_ Five jars of Nutella do not seem like a sign of bad judgment. It seems like the most WTF idea I’ve ever heard. Challenge accepted. _

**Noooooo! I’m not encouraging this behavior.**

_ I don’t know. I think you kind of did. You put five jars of Nutella in front of an emotional eater. What did you expect? _

**Not this. I just want to go on record and say that five jars of Nutella at once is a very, very bad idea. That being said, good luck! I’m an emotional eater too. What’s your go-to?**

_ Oreos. 110%. I could live off of them. How about you? _

**I’ll eat just about anything sweet. Can I ask something that might make things a little awkward?**

_ Go for it. _

__

They’re taking their own sweet time answering. I look at the last piece of paper we passed back and forth. I study their handwriting as if it will help me make sense of them. They’re handwriting is very neat. I wonder if that means I’m talking to a girl… I don’t think that’s okay to assume though. It could be a guy with really nice handwriting. My handwriting kind of looks like I contracted a kindergartner to scribe for me. 

I kind of hope I’m talking to a guy. It’s nothing against girls. I just think that a guy is gonna get me more, you know? But, really. Either is fine. It’s someone to talk to. Someone that gets this to some extent.

**I thought that when someone found out I was gay, it would be this really big deal, but here we are talking about books and Oreos. Is this what you expected?**

_ Not at all. I’m freaking shaking right now, but I didn’t want to keep talking about it if you didn’t want to talk about it. _

**I think I want to talk about it. You’re the only person I know that’s like me.**

_ You’re the only one I know too. I still can’t believe I met someone like me. Are you a boy? I’m a boy. Are you out to anyone? _

**I’m a boy. I’m not out to anyone yet. I feel like every time I get close, something gets in the way. Usually it’s someone pointing out that I don’t have, and have never had, a girlfriend. Usually that someone is my mom or dad. How do you tell them at that point?**

_ That sucks. Really. I know how hard that can be. Of course, I’ve had girlfriends, so I guess I get where my parents are coming from. It just makes it so much harder. I feel like once they’ve “learned” something about you, or they think they’ve learned something, they are reluctant to unlearn it. _

**Exactly. It’s a reminder that people have already put us in a box of who they think we are, and I’m terrified to show them that I don’t belong in that box. I kind of feel like everyone’s going about their day inside their box, and I’m the only one left outside.**

_ Wow, you have a way with words. That was the freaking perfect way of describing it. That’s exactly why I’m not out yet either. It’s like I hypothetically know that everyone will take it fine but my friends and family make a big deal about everything and I don’t want this to change how they see me. I’m still the same me I’ve always been. Also, I’m sitting outside that box with you, so you're not alone. _

**Is it bad that makes me feel better?**

_ No. Talking to you makes me feel better too. _

**I’m really happy you slipped your note under this wall. Did you know I was here?**

_ Actually, that was an accident – but a happy accident. I was just spinning the paper and it got away from me. I’m glad you were there. And I’m glad you wrote back. I feel so much less alone right now. _

**Me too.**

Mr. Lowe chooses that moment to come back. I can’t believe that an hour could fly so quickly. I can’t believe I was dreading detention. I almost want to ask for more time, but I can’t think of any reason that’s not shady and suspicious.

I give Mr. Lowe the shoe box and the three ideas that the mystery guy behind the wall and I liked the most. I make a show of slowly putting my stuff away. I’m so slow that Mr. Lowe leaves and asks me to turn off the lights when I go.

The moment Mr. Lowe is gone, I slip a note under the wall.

_ I’m being sprung. Thanks for sticking this out with me. I know you didn’t have to. _

A response never comes back, but I don’t really expect it to. I wish we could talk more, but there’s really no feasible way to continue talking. It’ll have to be enough to know that there’s someone else like me in the school.

It’s not enough though. I somehow already miss him. I give him a few minutes to leave before I throw everything in my bag and leave.

Just as I’m closing the door, Bram Greenfeld leaves the classroom next to mine. I freeze. For a split second, I wonder if someone else was in the classroom with him. Bram is this quiet kid that plays soccer with Nick and sits at my lunch table. I don’t know much about him, but I had no idea he might be gay. I don’t know why. I had no reason to assume he would be straight.

He looks like he has no idea what to do. That makes two of us.

We stand in this weird, tense silence for over a minute before I clear my throat. “Uh… hi.” I don’t know if he can actually hear me. I can’t hear myself over my pounding heart.

He opens his mouth, but I don’t think any sound comes out. “I thought you left,” he whispers after a moment.

“I waited because I wanted to give you time to leave,” I explain.

“So, we both waited,” he says quietly.

“Maybe it was meant to be,” I say before I can second guess myself. “I really liked talking to you. Even before I knew that you’re like me, you made a shitty detention enjoyable.”

“Simon, I’m not out,” he says quietly.

“Neither am I. I’m not saying we tell people. I’m not ready for anyone to know. But maybe we can talk some more,” I point out. He still looks reluctant. I sigh. “Look, I don’t want to make you uncomfortable, but… I… I’ve spent so much time hiding who I am. For whatever reason, you were the person on the other side of the wall. And somehow we started talking about… this.” It doesn’t feel safe to say the words out loud, even in an empty hallway. I don’t trust that there’s not a straggler somewhere. “When we were talking, I didn’t have to hide.” I shake my head. I don’t think I’m making any sense. “For what it’s worth, I’ll be here after school next week. I hope you’ll be here too.”

I start to walk away, but he calls, “wait!” I turn towards him. “Could we meet Thursday instead? I have to tutor every Wednesday.”

Thursday actually works so much better for me, I realize. I have rehearsal Monday through Wednesday until Thanksgiving. I’m missing it for detention right now, but Ms. Albright didn’t seem to mind. I think it helps that I don’t have a speaking role, so I’m essentially there to take up space.

“Don’t you have soccer?” I ask. Nick just said something at lunch today about soccer and I’m trying to remember how Garrett and Bram reacted. I wasn’t really listening because Leah was still pissy about Nick going to Homecoming instead of upholding our WaHo tradition and she’s always in a mood about the Nick-and-Abby-flirting thing. She looked particularly angry in that moment, so I’d been trying to appease her.

“No. We lost our playoff game yesterday.”

“Oh. Sorry.” I really need to start paying more attention to Nick when he talks. He was probably devastated. He loves soccer. “You’re really okay with this?” I ask uncertainly.

He nods. “I want to. It’s like you said. It was nice not to hide for once.”

“Great. See you Thursday. Actually, I guess I’ll see you at lunch tomorrow. Can you not…” I cut myself off. I feel like I don’t need to ask, but part of me really wants the confirmation that he’s not going to tell anyone.

“I’m not going to say anything,” he promises. It’s easy to believe that because this is the longest conversation I’ve ever had with him.

“Me neither.”

We awkwardly stand in the hallway another minute. “Okay… well… bye,” I say. I walk towards the exit just to realize that he’s walking in the same direction (I don’t know where else he would be going – all the students park in the same lot). We don’t say anything as we walk, and it’s almost a relief once I get in my car.

I can’t shake this weird feeling that’s a mix between anxiety and relief. It’s so surreal to know there’s someone out there that knows my secret. It’s even stranger to know that someone is Bram. I try to think of everything I know about him, but I don’t know much. In fact, outside of soccer and what I learned today, I don’t think I know anything. I’m determined to learn more about him.

I don’t try to talk to him at lunch, but I feel like I’m hyper aware of him. I notice how he ducks his head when Garrett tries to draw him into our group conversation, how he’ll randomly smile like he told himself a joke, and how he listens from the outside of conversations. He doesn’t talk much, but he kind of does speak volumes with his body language. You can tell exactly how he feels if you pay attention.

And boy, am I paying attention. I pay attention to little else over the next week. Bram in class is unlike anything I’ve ever seen before. I knew he was studious, but I didn’t know how focused he could be. I’m pretty sure I could dance naked in front of him, and he wouldn’t notice (unless I was simultaneously teaching him about completing the square).

The only time we talk is on Monday when he quietly wishes me a happy birthday as we’re walking to Algebra after lunch. Other than that, neither of us give any indication that we’re any different than we’ve always been. I don’t think anyone would know that something transpired that random Wednesday after school.

Finally, it’s Thursday. I dawdle as long as I can in my last class of the day and spend an excessive amount of time at my locker before I go to our Algebra classroom. Despite how much time I wasted, I get here before him. It feels weird to awkwardly linger outside the classroom, so I go inside. I don’t realize Mr. Lowe is hanging something on the bulletin board in the back of the classroom until I’m inside.

For a brief moment when I walk in, he looks panicked, like he forgot we were supposed to meet today or something. He quickly hides that. “What brings you here?” he asks.

“Uh…” Fortunately, Bram shows up before I can make it obvious that I have no reason to be here.

“Simon asked me if I could help him out with Algebra,” Bram says quietly. “Is it okay if we use your classroom?”

Mr. Lowe’s expression totally changes when he sees Bram. I thought Mr. Lowe liked me, but he’s looking at Bram like he’s his kid or something. Talk about favorites. “Oh, Bram. Of course. I’m sure this will really help boost his grade.” Mr. Lowe looks at me. I think he almost looks smug, which I don’t understand. “Bram is one of my strongest students. He’ll be able to help you with your fraction problem.” Mr. Lowe grabs his bag and starts to leave. “I’ll be back in an hour to lock up.”

Bram is biting his lip to keep from laughing. Once Mr. Lowe leaves, I turn to Bram. “For the record. I do not have a problem with fractions. Fractions have a problem with me.”

He chuckles. “If you say so,” he says. He closes the door firmly and walks towards the back of the classroom.

“I’m serious. I know how to do stuff with fractions. Something just always goes wrong,” I say defensively. I feel like Mr. Lowe made me sound like I suck with fractions. I don’t. They’re just not my strong suit. “That doesn’t matter though. Good thinking with the Algebra tutoring.”

He shrugs. “I figured he was going to be here, and he’s been asking me since September if I’d tutor. It seemed like the perfect excuse.”

“Plus, you’re like his favorite student apparently,” I grumble.

“What do you mean?” he asks cluelessly.

“Are you kidding? You saw him, right?” I ask.

He scrunches his forehead. “Yeah. And?”

“Nothing,” I say. I can’t believe he’s unaware of it.

I take a seat on top of a desk and drop my bag on the floor. Bram goes into his bag and pulls out a notebook and an Algebra textbook. He places it on a desk a few rows in front of me and then sits on top of a desk as well. I look at him curiously. “In case he comes back to check on us. We can say we’re taking a quick break,” he explains.

“You think of everything, don’t you?” I ask. I’m kind of amazed. I don’t think I’d remember lunch money in the morning if my mom didn’t remind me that I needed it to eat. I just don’t think of things like this until they’re necessary for me. I usually only think of these things when I’m wishing I’d thought of them earlier. He shrugs uncomfortably. “You don’t talk much, do you?”

He sighs. “I think I’m afraid of saying the wrong thing,” he explains.

“What do you think will happen if you say the wrong thing?” I ask curiously. I have a habit of saying things before I’ve fully thought them through, and nothing too terrible has ever happened as a result.

He looks like he’s actually thinking about my question. “I guess I am very critical of what I say and do. My mom says I’m my own worst enemy, but I expect other people to think and feel the same towards me as I do.”

“If I promise to tell you if I’m judging you, will you actually talk in here?” I ask.

He smiles this small, shy smile. “I’ll do my best,” he promises.

“Thanks,” I say. I thrum my fingers on my knee. “I’m really happy you came today.”

“I told you I would,” he points out.

“Still. It can’t have been easy.”

“Was it easy for you?” he asks.

“Honestly? It was surprisingly easy. I’ve actually been looking forward to this,” I admit. I watch him as he takes that in, and he looks pleased.

“Me too. Talking to you last week was the first time I’ve ever talked about this stuff. I thought I’d hate it, but I actually liked it,” he agrees.

“Speaking of which, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it,” I tell him. “I don’t really know how to do this. I’ve spent most of my time hiding the fact that I’m gay.” The word kind of sits between us for a moment. How do you talk about something that’s always been a secret?

“Did you know? Last year when you were dating Carys?”

“I didn’t know you knew about that,” I say surprised. Carys and I definitely never acted like we were dating when we were in school. It’s actually one of the reasons she broke up with me. After four months when I’d never attempted to do more than kiss her, she didn’t think I was into her. I’d known she wanted more and she wanted to take things further, but I couldn’t do it. I just felt so nauseated at the thought

“She and Courtney were in my gym class last year. She used to complain about you… a lot,” he admits.

“Oh, God.” I groan. Courtney is Carys’ best friend, and she’s always despised me. I didn’t understand it at the time, and Nick always thought she was jealous, but maybe she just wanted someone better for her best friend. “I don’t even want to know what she said.”

“No, you don’t,” he agrees. He has this mischievous smile on his face that makes me want to ask.

“But say I did,” I say slowly.

“I would tell you that she was…” he looks at the wall as he grapples for the right word. “Confused with your relationship. She felt you were oblivious to her advances, and she felt your response to her parents being gone for the weekend was not what she hoped it would be. I think you actually broke up with her that weekend because she stopped talking about you after that.”

“She broke up with me,” I correct. I know exactly what weekend he’s talking about because we broke up in the middle of mini golf.

“What happened?” he asks curiously.

I’ve never told anyone what happened at mini golf that weekend. It still makes my stomach twist into guilty knots. I just told them we mutually decided we were better off as friends… it was kind of mutual. “We went out that Friday night. Mini golf,” I start. “She asked me if I wanted to come over afterwards. I don’t even remember what excuse I made. I’d been making excuses since we started dating so we’d barely been alone. We were always in public or with other friends. She told me that she wanted to have a romantic weekend with the guy she loved, and I panicked. No one had ever said it to me before, and apparently staring and saying, “uh” is not the appropriate response.” I don’t look at Bram. There’s no way he’s not utterly repulsed by this. “I knew I was gay. It’s why I could never make myself feel excited about doing things with her.”

“How did you end up dating her if you knew?” he asks. He actually doesn’t sound judgmental. He just sounds curious.

“The same way I dated Anna for three months our freshman year and Rachel for, like, two-and-a-half weeks in the eighth grade. They asked me out, and I didn’t say no.” I sigh and rub my eyes. I’m definitely not looking great right now.

“Wait. Rachel Thomas?” Bram asks.

I almost forgot that he wasn’t here in middle school. “Yeah,” I confirm. “Not one of my finer moments.”

“Were you her Valentine Villain?” Bram questions. His smile is huge – I’ve never seen him with a genuine, big smile before. It makes his eyes look like they’re freaking twinkling and illuminates his whole face.

“She does not call me that,” I groan.

“She only did it once. Last year when she was explaining why she doesn’t like Valentine’s Day,” he provides. “She didn’t go into detail. She just said something happened at a middle school dance. She was explaining it to Liam O’Connell as a reason that he needed to go above and beyond to redeem her faith in the holiday.”

“Yeah, that was me. I spent the night hiding in the bathroom so I wouldn’t have to kiss her. I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t want to hurt her, but I also didn’t want to come out. I feel like I sound like an asshole when I say it like that. I used to tell myself that I wasn’t sure I was gay, or I didn’t think it was permanent because that makes it a lot easier to sit with, but… I think I just didn’t want this to be me, you know? I don’t want to have to reintroduce myself to the world; I don’t want things to change. It’s pretty messed up, right?”

“Yeah, but I get it.” he says with a sigh. “I know exactly what you mean. I know that everything will be different once I come out.” He wraps his arms around himself like he’s holding himself together. “I don’t do well with change. It seems like there was so much happening when I realized I was gay.” He shakes his head. “It wasn’t pretty.

“When did you know?” I ask curiously.

“At my dad’s wedding,” he explains softly. “I met my stepmom’s cousin for the first time and…” His eyelids kind of flutter as he looks down at the floor. If I needed a look to represent embarrassment, this is it.

“Ooh,” I say excitedly. “This is gonna be good.” I lean back for dramatic effect, but I lose my balance and nearly topple off the desk. I have to use another desk to steady myself and keep my desk from falling over.

Bram eyes are bulging a little and his cheeks stick out from his effort to hold in his laughter. He takes one look at my indignant expression, and he can’t keep it in. Like everything he does, his laugh is quiet and soft, but it’s the kind of laugh that makes you smile. In our almost-empty classroom, it echoes a little.

I find myself joining him after a moment, and it’s such an ordinary moment. For a minute, we’re not two kids that can understand how scary and uncomfortable it is to be closeted; we’re just two friends sharing a carefree moment.

As we calm down, Bram wipes his eyes. He literally laughed so freaking hard he cried. I can’t. That knowledge somehow offsets another round of hysterical laughter. I have to get off my desk and crouch down to calm myself down. “I needed that,” he whispers. His voice sounds a little wheezy as if he’s still trying to catch his breath. “It’s still hard for me to think about my dad’s wedding. I feel so weird about it. It’s not even like anyone knew something happened other than me.” 

“You don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to,” I assure him.

“No, it’s fine. It’s not really that bad. He asked me a question about whether I was enjoying myself at the wedding, and I just kind of stared at him. I didn’t know what was happening at the time, but it was a crush. I had it all – butterflies, my hands got sweaty, I couldn’t talk. Eventually I realized why I felt that way. Mid-bite of this really delicious chocolate cake.” He shakes his head and looks sad for a moment. “Do you know what’s sad? This was one of the greatest days of my dad’s life and the thing I remember the most is that I got so upset, I couldn’t even finish the cake. I spent the rest of the night glued to my chair. I’m pretty sure her cousin caught me staring at him a few times. He probably still thinks I’m his cousin’s weird twelve-year-old stepson.”

“That sounds… intense. Have you seen him since the wedding?”

Bram nods. “I see him a few times a year. My stepmom seems to do a lot of family reunions, and my mom likes me to go to them. She tries really hard to be supportive of my dad and everything.”

“That must be awkward,” I observe.

“Which part?” he asks. “Seeing him or my mom supporting my dad?”

“Both?” I guess. “But mostly seeing him now.”

“It’s not so bad anymore. He’s married now, and I think his wife is pregnant. It helps that no one outside of this room knows,” he acknowledges. “I think I’ve stopped being weird around him.”

“And the divorced parents?” I ask curiously.

“I don’t think that will ever stop being weird. I don’t know if it’s me projecting how weird I find it, but it sometimes feels like they try too hard to be cool with each other.”

“How so?” I wonder if it’s weird that I’m asking, but I can’t help my curiosity. Leah never talks about what happened with her mom and dad, and she never really sees her dad. She’s the only other person I know that has divorced parents.

“My dad will make jokes about my mom meeting someone, and my mom tries really hard to be on board with everything with my stepmom,” he explains. 

“That does sound weird. Do you see your dad often?”

“A few times a year. I stay with him in Savannah for a week after Christmas and two weeks over the summer. Other than that, he comes here a couple times a year. I’ll see him in two weeks for Hotel Hanukkah.”

“You’re Jewish?” I don’t know why I’m so surprised by that. It’s not like I expect him to walk around in a yamaka and read from the Torah or anything like that.

“Sort of. My dad’s jewish, but Judaism is technically matrilineal. If we’re going by my mom, I’m technically episcopalian.”

“Which do you prefer?” I ask curiously. Nick is Jewish, but he’s not super religious. It’s weird to think of someone having religious parents. I think we owned a Bible at some point, but I couldn’t tell you where it is now. Maybe in our basement or something.

“I don’t know,” he says quietly. “No one’s actually asked me that before, and it was easier to stay neutral when I was a kid.”

“Oh,” I say quietly. I feel like I have ten thousand questions for him, but I don’t know how far I can push him.

Fortunately and unfortunately, Mr. Lowe walks in at that moment. It’s like a bubble popped. I hadn’t realized how intense our conversation had gotten. I hadn’t even heard Mr. Lowe key into the classroom.

Bram jumps off his desk and almost looks like he got caught doing something wrong. 

“How’d it go?” Mr. Lowe asks. He’s not even looking at us. He puts something on his desk and grabs his water bottle.

“It was very productive,” I say. “I learned a lot.”

Bram’s lips twitch just slightly as he smiles. “I think we’re going to make this a weekly thing?” he asks. I nod eagerly. I would love nothing more. “Is it okay if we meet in here next week?”

“That would be Thanksgiving,” Mr. Lowe points out.

I hadn’t even thought of Thanksgiving. Usually, I would love nothing more than two days off of school, but this is massively inconvenient for me. “Tuesday?” I ask uncertainly. I don’t know if that’s too soon for him, but I really don’t want to wait two weeks to talk to him again. I feel like we barely scratched the surface.

“Tuesday works,” Bram agrees.

Mr. Lowe writes something on his desk calendar. “I am taking off right after school on Tuesday, but I’ll make sure to leave the door unlocked for you.”

“Thank you, sir,” Bram says respectfully. Sir? He called him sir. No wonder Mr. Lowe loves him.

We follow Mr. Lowe out of the classroom. “I didn’t realize Thanksgiving was next Thursday,” I say as we’re walking to our cars.

“Me neither,” he agrees.

“Was today okay?” I ask uncertainly. “I know we talked about a lot.”

“Today was amazing,” he says softly. “I didn’t really think I was going to be able to talk that much. It’s not like me.”

“Then why did you?” I question. “Not that I’m upset about it. I’m really glad you did… but I was surprised too.”

“You asked,” he says with a shrug. “I established myself as the quiet kid pretty early on, so most people don’t even try anymore. It’s not a bad thing; it works for me. You’re different. You asked and you waited for me to get my thoughts together. You didn’t make me feel like what I was saying was awkward or weird.”

“I didn’t think it was,” I explain. We’re lingering near the trunk of my car. I feel butterflies in my stomach, and I don’t fully understand why.

“See you Tuesday?”

“Tuesday,” I confirm. I don’t realize until I put my car into drive that I have rehearsal on Tuesday. My hand tightens on my wheel. I’ve known I was going to have to talk to Ms. Albright after Thanksgiving because we’re going to start rehearsing everyday after school. I just have to hope she’ll be okay with this. I’ll find her during lunch tomorrow.

As I drive home, I wonder if it’s a lie to tell Ms. Albright I joined a club. This is technically a club, right? I mean, we’re talking about things that are important to us. Isn’t that what clubs do? We’re like a two person GSA; except we’re missing the S. No one needs to know that.

Ms. Albright is fine with it. She doesn’t even ask me what club I’m in. She just says that once we start two-hour rehearsals, I’ll need to come to play rehearsal late on club meeting days instead of leaving, and I have to come to every rehearsal the week of our performances. I think that’s more than fair. I don’t have to worry about that for a few more weeks because two-hour rehearsals won’t start until after winter break. I’m really surprised that I don’t have to plead my case (I’d even prepared an argument), but she just says that it’s important to feel a sense of belonging with multiple groups at school.

The weekend is weird. I think I’m starting to get a little obsessive over the conversation we had on Thursday because I keep playing it over and over again in my head. It was so freaking nice to talk about some of those things. No one other than Bram knows these things about me. It should scare me, but I really like that someone knows. I didn’t realize how lonely those secrets were, but now I don’t feel so alone.

Sunday, I sit in Nick’s basement with Leah and him as they play video games. It gives me way too much time to think about Bram. I still don’t know that much about him. I know a lot more than I did, but I’m surprised by how much more I want to know. I feel the strangest need to know everything. 

I get a kind of weird idea in my head and I can’t shake it, so when Tuesday rolls around, I’m sitting in our Algebra classroom with one of my dad’s baseball caps stuffed with different prompts I found when I should have been working on my English paper.

Bram walks in a moment later and shuts the door behind him. He takes a seat on the same desk as last week. “Hey,” he says. He opens his bag and pulls out a pack of Oreos. “I brought us a snack.”

I stare at the Oreos. They may as well have been made of gold. My heart is hammering in my chest. I can’t believe he got Oreos. “That’s freaking amazing,” I tell him. He opens the pack and grabs an Oreo before he passes them to me. I take a bite of an Oreo (I’ve been known to shove the entire Oreo into my mouth – it’s one of my skills, but I don’t think Bram is ready to see that side of me). I sigh happily. “Thanks for bringing these in.”

He shrugs. “I figured we should have food. I told Garrett I joined a club, and this makes it feel like less of a lie.”

I chuckle. “I told Ms. Albright the same thing.” He smiles but doesn’t say anything else. I kind of figured after everything we talked about last week, conversation would come so easily, but it’s still hard to figure out where to start. I decide to start with the baseball cap. “Hey. So, I had a kind of weird idea.”

“What’s your weird idea?” he asks curiously.

“I was thinking about what you said last week. That you were able to talk about stuff because I asked you about it,” I say slowly. “And I was thinking it might be nice if we got to know more about each other than us being gay. So, I wrote down some questions and put them in here. I thought that maybe we could go through one a week. If you’re cool with that. I don’t want to make you uncomfortable or anything.”

“May I?” he asks. He holds out his hand and I pass him the hat. “How many weeks do you think we’ll be meeting?” He’s rifling through the pieces of paper and pulls out one from the bottom.

I shrug. “I just wrote down as many questions as I could think of. If you want to add any, you can.”

“If I think of one, I’ll add it.” He clears his throat and opens the piece of paper. “If you knew you were going to be stranded on a deserted island, what five items would you bring?” he reads. He frowns a little and bites the corner of his lip as he thinks about the question. “What are my parameters?”

“What do you mean?”

“Does a book series count as one item or however many books there are?” he clarifies. “And if I say a change of clothes, is that multiple items or just one?”

“I would say things that go together count as one,” I decide.

“Can they be living?” he asks.

I figure he means a dog or something, so I determine, “yeah, I don’t see why not.”

He looks deep in thought, and I kind of love how seriously he’s taking this. “I would bring an unsinkable boat with oars.” He puts up one finger. “A book of maps that will help me get off the island. A change of clothes. Garrett. And a deck of cards.”

“Really?” I ask. “Garrett and a deck of cards?”

He shrugs. “We can take turns rowing the boat, and he’ll go insane without something to do. Have you ever seen Garrett bored?”

“So, the cards are for him?”

“They may have multiple purposes,” he says slowly. “I may enjoy the casual game of Solitaire every now and then.”

It’s really not that hard to believe. I have this mental image of Bram lying on his stomach on his bedroom floor and playing Solitaire. “Do you play any games that aren’t solo activities?” I ask curiously.

He looks uncomfortable. “My dad and I used to play cards when I was younger and for a little while after the divorce. We don’t really do that anymore, and I don’t know many kids our age who play card games.”

“What kinds of games would you play?”

“Just about anything that you could play with two people. My favorite was our version of Texas hold’em. We used to wager pretzel sticks.” He has a small, sad smile on his face. I can tell how much he misses it.

“We should play that next week,” I suggest.

“Really?”

“Why not? I’ll bring the pretzels. You bring the cards.”

“I’d really like that.” He ducks his head a little. “Your turn. Five items. Go.”

“The whole Harry Potter series,” I start. I frown. “Nick inside a boat with oars.”

“Are you counting that as one object?” he asks incredulously.

I hold my hands up defensively. “I don’t make the rules.”

“You literally do,” he points out. His lips twitch like he’s trying not to laugh.

“You’re right. I make the rules. As the rule maker, I say it’s fine,” I declare victoriously. I try to say it with a straight face, but my composure cracks on the last word and my laughter spills out.

“Okay. So, after the absurdity of Nick, oars, and a boat all being one item, what are your last three items?”

“My third item would be…” I frown as I think. “I don’t know. Probably Macafee. Isn’t he the guy that sailed all over the freaking world?”

“Are you talking about Magellan?” Bram asks. “The guy that circumnavigated the globe?”

“Yeah. Him. He could navigate. And then I would bring my phone, wireless charger with endless power, and headphones.”

“Is that all one item too?” he asks.

“It’s two. Magellan is one. And then my phone and accessories are one. Two items,” I explain.

“I’m surprised you didn’t have Magellan holding those things.”

I frown. “That would have been a really good idea.”

He chuckles. “And your last thing?”

“You with a bag of pretzels in one hand and a deck of cards in the other,” I tell him smugly. “We can play cards while Nick rows the boat, and Magellan tells him where to go.”

“I’m flattered I make the cut.” He’s playing with a hole in the knee of his jeans.

I bite my lip. “I love Nick and Leah and all, but I didn’t realize how lonely I was until we started talking. There’s a whole part of my life that I can’t share with them. I know that we’ve only been talking a few weeks, but I’ve already told you so much that no one else knows. I feel like I get to be myself with you. If I’m stranded on an island, I think I’d like someone that makes me feel like that, you know?”

He smiles but doesn’t look away from his jeans. “I feel the same way. It’s actually really nice to talk about this stuff.”

“Good.” I play with the strings on my hoodie. “You and Garrett are really close, huh?”

Bram smiles. “He’s my best friend,” he agrees.

“Do you like him?” I ask. I try to sound like I’m teasing him.

Bram chuckles. “You know, it always surprised me that I didn’t. I mean, he’s not unattractive and he’s always been so nice to me. But no. I don’t like him. Not like that at least. I’ve never wanted more than friendship. What about you and Nick?”

“I never let myself think about it. I have a strict don’t-fall-for-Nick policy,” I explain. “I saw what Leah liking him did to us, so I took it off the table before it could even potentially be a problem.”

“Leah likes Nick?” Bram asks. “I didn’t see that coming.”

I shrug. “She’s never actually told me that she likes him, but I see how she acts around him and how jealous she is of Abby. Don’t, uh, tell anyone. I think Leah might actually kill me if she found out.”

“I won’t say anything. As long as you don’t tell anyone that Garrett’s into Leah.”

I stare at him. “Garrett. Leah. What?” I ask. I didn’t know that Garrett had ever talked to Leah.

“It’s part of the reason that Garrett is so… much at lunch,” Bram explains. “He’s not usually that energetic.”

“Huh. That’s interesting.” I’ll have to start paying more attention at lunch because I literally had no idea that Garrett was interested in Leah. I make a mental note to try to see if Leah might be open to the idea of dating Garrett.

“I think we should ask another question,” he proposes.

“Oh. Sure,” I say surprised. He grabs the hat off the desk behind him and passes it to me.

I pull out one. “Describe your perfect future.”

We’re both quiet as we think about our answers. “I think I see myself as an editor or a publisher. Something like that,” he says slowly. “Maybe living in New York with a husband and a dog. How about you?”

I have to look away from him when he says that because all I can think about is how that bodes well for me as I fully intend to have a dog and be a husband one day. The thought is so unexpected, but I guess it makes sense. All the butterflies, how much I’ve been thinking about him… of course, I’m crushing on him. I think it’s only natural. I recently found out he’s gay, so he’s on my mind. I’m sure it will fade as we spend more time together. I look through my bag for my water, so he can’t see my face.

It’s got to fade, right? This is our safe space. I can’t complicate it with a freaking crush.

I take a sip of my water, and it helps a little. “I want the dog, husband, perfect family, and all that,” I say vaguely. I’m aware of how hard I’m trying to be normal right now and I’m pretty sure it’s just making me weirder. “I don’t really know what I want to do for a living. I’ve always thought it would be cool to teach sociology or psychology. Create an actual space for people to talk about who they really are. But then I come here and that seems like an impossibly far-fetched goal.”

“I could see you doing that,” Bram tells me. “So many teachers here are out of their element with this stuff, but you wouldn’t be. I think you’d be able to inspire your students to be their authentic selves.”

“You think?” I ask uncertainly. “Because when I told Leah and Nick, they didn’t share your enthusiasm.”

“I think maybe Leah and Nick haven’t seen the same side of you that I have. If you got me to open up, you can get anyone to open up. Trust me.”

“Huh. Thanks,” I say quietly. 

“You want the dog and husband too?” he asks. I know it’s my imagination, but for a minute, it’s really easy to pretend that there’s a note of longing in his voice.

“I practically grew up with Bieber. I can’t imagine my life without a dog.”

“Bieber?” his eyes crinkle just a little.

“He is the most perfect dog in the world,” I gush. Bieber is literally my favorite. “We got him when I was nine or ten, but I feel like I don’t actually remember my life without him in it.” I whip out my phone. Bieber is the subject of about 99% of the pictures of my phone, so it only takes going to my gallery to find a picture.

I pass my phone to Bram and a huge smile lights up his face. “Can I scroll or am I going to come across something I don’t want to see?”

I have no clue what he thinks he’s going to find on my phone. “I mean. You’re going to see pictures of Bieber and maybe one picture that Abby forced us to take when we all started hanging out a few months ago,” I say slowly. Bram looks relieved. “What did you think you were going to find?”

He shrugs. “When my cousin on my dad’s side was showing us pictures of his girlfriend at my Grandma’s birthday party in August, I made the mistake of flipping through his pictures and I saw way more of him and way more of his girlfriend than I ever wanted to.”

An awkward, uncomfortable laugh escapes me. I’m pretty sure I’m blushing if my sudden warmth is anything to go off of. “Yikes. So, you want to be an editor? How’d you get into that?” If he finds my sudden subject change jarring, he doesn’t say anything.

He nods. He still hasn’t taken his eyes off my phone as he looks at picture after picture of Bieber. “My dad’s an English teacher, and I think he’s always wanted me to go in that direction, but I don’t want to teach. In our AP class it’s different, but most kids don’t actually read the books they’re supposed to. It’s not their fault. Grammar and writing aren’t things that interest them, but I want to work with people who care about what they’re doing and not just because they’re getting a grade for it. I really like the idea of being able to work with authors on projects that they’re truly passionate about.”

“That sounds freaking awesome,” I tell him. “I think you’d be really great at that.”

“I hope so. I wish I could know if I’ll be good at it.” He puts my phone aside and bunches his hands into fists, which makes me realize it’s really hard for him to admit that. I’m silent as he thinks. I don’t want to be the reason he can’t get this out. “It’s one of my biggest fears. I’ve worked hard my whole life to avoid failure, but this isn’t school. If I’m not good at this, that’s it. I can’t go home and complete an extra credit assignment or practice a few soccer drills to make up for something I didn’t master.”

I bite my lip. I’m so bad at this. Leah and Nick have been telling me that I’m terrible at advice since we became friends, and I desperately don’t want to mess this up. “I can’t say what will happen,” I say slowly. “Maybe you’ll suck at it.” His eyes widen, so I hastily add. “But you probably won’t. You’ll probably rock the freaking socks off of it.” I don’t even know if that’s a thing people say. I’m going to roll with it. “If you don’t, I’m sure you’ll go home and read a book or learn more about it. It might not be school, but it’s definitely not all or nothing. Who’s really good at stuff right away anyway? The first time I ever shot a basketball, it went backwards… I’m not going to claim to be good now, but I can shoot in the general direction of the net.” He chuckles. “Things take time. Maybe you won’t be great at it right away, but you can learn. And you can get better. Don’t think that if you try it and it doesn’t work out that it never will.”

“So I’ll be terrible. And I’ll be great. And if I’m bad, I’ll learn.” I actually worry that was his takeaway until he chuckles. “No, I get what you’re saying. Thanks. I think I needed to hear that.”

I shrug. “Anytime.” We sit on our desks for a moment in silence. It’s not weird. It’s kind of nice, actually. I glance at the clock of the wall instinctively - it’s like I’m hardwired to look at it every couple of seconds in class and even without Mr. Lowe teaching in the front of the classroom, I can’t fight my body’s conditioning. “Holy shit,” I whisper. “It’s almost been an hour. How is that even freaking possible?”

Bram looks at the clock for confirmation and looks as surprised as I feel. We’ve only asked two questions. “Time is strange,” he says.

I nod to show my agreement. So weird. We kind of half ass a conversation after that. There’s not enough time to delve into something real, but I don’t want to leave. I don’t think he does either. I wonder if we will ever stop teeter tottering between amazing and weird. I don’t know if I want it to. The weird is what makes it real. If this wasn’t uncomfortable and awkward at times, I don’t think it would be sustainable. And I really want this to last.

There’s something different between us after that day. I don’t know how to explain it. We have nearly a week and a half before we meet again and everyday at lunch, I get this small smile from Bram before he composes himself into the same quiet, reluctant kid he always is at lunch. I doubt anyone else notices it, but it’s like he picked out the smile just for me. 

The following Thursday, we play Texas Hold’em. We play his version because apparently my father lied to me the few times we played to make me feel like I didn’t suck at this game. Bram beats me every freaking time. But he shares his pretzels, so it’s cool.

We completely lose track of time until this older guy with white hair sticking out of his ears comes in to take out the trash. I’ve never seen him before, so I figure he must come in after school to help clean the building. “You kids still here?” he asks. 

“Oh. We’re finishing up now,” I tell him. We are here way later than we should have been. I’d be surprised if there are any other kids in the building. I just lost myself in the game. Don’t get me wrong; Texas Hold’em freaking sucks but playing a casual game with Bram is amazing. I’m surprised that Mr. Lowe never came back. We must not be the only ones that lost track of time.

I put the cards by me in a neat stack and hand them to Bram. We don’t look at each other as we pack up and leave.

“We should probably set an alarm next week,” I say as we walk to our cars. “I didn’t realize how long we’ve been playing.”

“That’s not a bad idea,” he agrees. I sigh. I guess the casual ease of our afternoon was shattered the moment that janitor walked in. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” I tell him. “I guess… I just thought this would get easier, you know? But sometimes it still feels weird.”

“I’m sorry.” He looks genuinely upset, as if my weirdness is on him. We’re lingering near the trunk of his car. Ours are the only two cars in the student lot right now.

“No, it’s not you. I feel like I make things weird,” I try to explain. Why are words so hard around him?

“It’s okay. I like weird.”

He climbs into his car, and I think it’s for the best because I’m pretty sure I’m blushing. I’m confident he didn’t mean it the way I heard it, but it almost feels like he was flirting. My heart is hammering in my chest, and I may just float away. I walk to my car. He likes weird.

I don’t come down from my cloud until lunch the next day when Abby asks, “where the hell were you yesterday?”

“Huh?” I ask.

“You missed rehearsal. Where were you?” she asks.

“Oh,” I say. “I talked to Ms. Albright about that. I joined a club.”

“What club could possibly be more important than the play?”

“The… Breakfast Club.” I close my eyes. I’m an idiot. Of all the clubs our school offers. And the first one that pops into my head is the freaking breakfast club. I think I’m gonna blame my dad. He’s obsessed with that movie.

“The Breakfast Club?” Leah asks skeptically.

“Uh. Yeah,” I say. “It’s a new club.”

“Bram, didn’t you join a club?” Garrett asks. “You were there for hours yesterday.”

Poor Bram looks so put on the spot. “Yeah. It’s the same club. Mr. Lowe advises it. He gives us extra credit if we go to meetings,” he says. To his credit, while he looks flustered, he doesn’t look like he’s lying. He just looks like he wasn’t fully prepared to have to talk.

Thank God for Bram because no one pushes us further on it. Also, thank God that we happen to be in the only Algebra 2 class that Mr. Lowe teaches. Mrs. Hilton teaches most of the Algebra 2 classes and the other Honors class. I’d felt so left out at the start of the year because Leah, Nick, and Abby kept going on about her, and I couldn’t contribute, but it’s incredibly convenient for me right now.

It feels like such a long week until Thursday. Things are just weird everywhere. Nick and Abby are so disgustingly flirty which means Leah is pissy all the time. And the things with my family that I used to find tolerable are really irritating now. I think I’m starting to feel dissatisfied with hiding who I really am and it's only making me more and more agitated. It all culminated in the shitshow with my family last night. 

I don’t think I actually breathe until Bram walks in on Thursday. I’m sitting at a desk pretending to work on the homework from today. I desperately want to tell him about my night. 

“So, we’re the breakfast club? Should I start bringing pancakes to meetings?” Bram asks when Mr. Lowe leaves us. He has a mischievous smile on his face, and he must have been waiting all week to drop that line.

I move to sit on my desk in the back of the classroom. Bram does the same.

“Nah. We have to go with waffles. Pancakes are so overrated,” I throw back.

Bram chuckles. “What was I thinking?”

“I dunno. You clearly have a lot to learn,” I tease. I feel my smile melt away. “About the Breakfast Club thing. I’m really sorry. I didn’t know what to say. I still am not ready for them to know.” Except, as I say the words, I’m not so sure that’s true. The idea of them knowing isn’t as terrifying as it was a few weeks ago. “It’s the first thing that popped into my head.”

He shrugs. “I’m not mad. I’m a little relieved that they bought it.”

“That’s all you. I don’t think they believed me until you corroborated my lie.”

“I don’t know how I feel about aiding and abetting a lie,” Bram says.

“You can’t fool me. I know you live above the law,” I tease.

“You’ve really got me down. Sometimes, I even jaywalk.” His cheeks are getting puffy like he’s holding his breath to keep in his laugh.

I raise my eyebrows at him. Somehow, I really don’t think he does. “Do you though?”

He looks down at the floor. “I’m sure I’ve done it before,” he grumbles.

I bite my cheek. He’s genuinely the perfect human being. It’s not fair. “Are you upset that you don’t break the law more often?” I ask.

He looks at me. “Do you want the real answer?” He’s smiling, but his tone is serious.

“Of course.” I lean forward a little bit to give him my undivided attention.

“It’s not that I wish I’d break the law more, but I wish I’d stop holding myself back. It’s like I have a set of rules that are absolute for me, and I can’t break those. It sometimes feels like the things that come so naturally to everyone else take me a really long time to build up to.” He’s looking at me like he’s trying to see my soul. “Sometimes I never get there.”

“Like what?” I ask curiously.

He frowns. “Like when I don’t talk about the things important to me because I’m afraid to let people see the real me.”

“Maybe it just takes time,” I suggest. “Look at how you are in here. You talk about the important stuff all the time.”

“Yeah. Sometimes.” I can’t help but feel like he’s trying to say something that I’m completely missing.

It comes to me after an unbearably uncomfortable minute of silence. “Is this one of the things? That you’re having trouble saying?” I ask. He nods. “For what it’s worth, I’m sure you’ll talk about it when you’re ready to. And… there’s nothing you could say that would make me uncomfortable. I see the real you. And I think you’re pretty great.”

“Thanks. I think…” He shakes his head. “I think I’m really lucky that we started talking.”

“Me too,” I say simply. And it’s true. Detention may have been the best thing to ever happen to me. “So, have I told you that my family is really obsessed with the Bachelor?”

“No,” he says slowly. He looks a little confused.

“The new season is airing in a few weeks, so we’re rewatching the season of the Bachelorette he was on… as if we didn’t just watch it. And then we Skype with Alice about it,” I explain. He’s looking at me cluelessly. “The guy they chose for this season came in third last season on the Bachelorette.” I’m trying really hard to sound nonchalant, but I am kind of lowkey obsessed with the Bachelor. Probably because my parents made it impossible to escape… and there’s just so much drama. It’s like a train wreck. I know I should look away, but I can’t pry my eyes away. “Anyway. It got really weird.”

“Weird how?” he probes.

“My dad likes to make these jokes. When there’s a guy on the Bachelorette that he thinks is too in touch with his feelings, he likes to call them gay.” He’s been doing this as long as I can remember, but it really got to me last night. “I was sitting in our family room as my family essentially debated whether one of the contestants was gay and whether it was okay for my dad to assume that they’re gay. I kind of lost it. I told them that it’s none of our business who is or isn’t gay. And then I spent the rest of the night sulking in my bedroom.”

“That sounds really rough.” I swear, his eyes get bigger. “You said your dad does this a lot?”

“Often enough,” I confirm. “I can never figure out if he means the stuff he says or if he’s just trying to push my older sister’s buttons. She’s weirdly sensitive to that kind of stuff.” I shake my head. I know Alice means well, but sometimes she just makes things worse.

“Wow.” He tilts his head a little and looks at me thoughtfully. “I don’t know if you actually need to hear this, but it’s really shitty that you had to listen to that. It must make it really difficult to come out to them.”

“Yeah,” I agree. “I almost told them. My mom asked me what I would do if I was on a date with the bachelorette, and I came so close to telling them I’d rather be on a date with the bachelor. But then my dad made his joke and… I just don’t know how I’m ever going to be able to tell them.”

“Do you want to tell them?” He asks.

“Yes and no. I’m so freaking tired of hiding who I am from the world. This has been freaking amazing. I don’t want an hour a week with you to be the only time I feel this… free.” I look up at him. It’s so hard to believe that five weeks ago I barely knew him. He was just the quiet kid at my lunch table. Now? I think I like him more than anyone else in my life… in a platonic way, I remind myself. It has to be in a platonic way. “Sometimes, I think I imagine that my family is different… like, that they’ll be totally cool with this and won’t make it weird. But then we talk about the Bachelorette and I realize I’ve been deluding myself. I almost think it would be easier to just have a secret life they don’t know about. The idea of meeting someone and dating and getting married and starting a family seems so much more feasible if I don’t involve them.” I hear the words after I say them. “I think that’s the worst thing I’ve ever said. I don’t actually plan on doing that. Eventually, I’ll bite the bullet and tell them.”

“I don’t think it should be biting the bullet, though. It shouldn’t be this hard,” he says.

“Do you know what would make it easier?”

“No,” he answers honestly.

“If everyone had to come out. Imagine if it wasn’t just on us to come out. And if everyone started with a blank slate,” I tell him. “No assumptions about whether you’re straight, gay, or something else. Nothing until you choose to tell the world officially.”

“That sounds really nice,” he agrees. “It would take all the pressure off.”

I sigh. It does seem like it would be the answer to all of my problems, but that world doesn’t exist yet. Maybe it will one day, but today, we still live in a world where people think you’re straight until you tell them otherwise. “I guess for now, we have to figure out how to actually come out. Then we can worry about creating that world.”

“You’ll change the world one Sociology class at a time,” he says confidently.

“You remembered.”

“Of course.” He shrugs like it's no big deal, but it feels like a big deal.

“I know we haven’t talked about this in awhile, but where are you at with all of this?” I ask. We haven’t been intentionally avoiding the topic. I feel like we’ve just had so much to learn about each other.

“The idea is getting less scary which somehow makes it all scarier.” He gets a small smile on his face. “I know that doesn’t make any sense.”

It actually makes a lot of sense to me. “I think it does,” I tell him seriously. “It’s scary in a different way, right? It’s less about accepting who you are and more about how other people will see you.”

He looks amazed. “I swear, sometimes it’s like you can read my mind.”

It inexplicably makes me blush. I look away from him and hope he won’t notice. I grapple for something that can change the subject. And it comes to me. “Nope,” I say in what I hope is a nonchalant tone. “Though, that would be a really good superpower. What superpower do you think you’d want?”

This spawns a debate on whether invisibility or mind reading is a better superpower. 

Bram is in the middle of a pretty convincing argument for invisibility when we hear the doorknob jingle.

I’m just sitting down in one of our staged desks when Mr. Lowe walks in.

“You’re really close,” Bram says. “You just have to keep track of your signs. This is negative, so you have to flip it to become positive.” I literally draw a smiley face on my paper. “Perfect!” He closes his textbook as if we’ve just finished a lesson or something.

We pack up. I guess Mr. Lowe is staying late because he sits at his desk with a mug of coffee. It dawns on me while I’m driving home that there’s only one more Thursday before winter break. The idea of going two weeks without seeing Bram makes my heart ache. I have to talk to him about maybe meeting up over break, but the idea makes me really anxious. I feel like we’ve been living in a bubble, and the last thing I want to do is pop that bubble.

I can’t even sit down as I wait for him in our classroom on Thursday. I didn’t sleep after the night I had and the only thing that’s been getting me through my day is the pure adrenaline of anticipation. Mr. Lowe is all packed up and he asks me if we’ll close the door when we’re done today. I think I agree. I’m not sure. I’m so jittery and weirdly awake even though I didn’t sleep last night.

When Bram walks in, I inexplicably get even more nervous. “I came out to Abby,” I tell him before he even has the chance to say hello. My words seem to trip over each other as they come out, but he clearly figures out what I’m saying if his gaping mouth is anything to go on.

“Tell me about it,” he says softly.

“Leah texted me yesterday when we got out of play practice. She and Nick were at Waffle House and she wanted to invite me. I bribed Abby into coming with us. Told her I would drive her home. She usually takes the bus,” I start. Bram doesn’t sit down, but he puts his bag down. “While we were there, Nick and Abby told us they started dating. It was weird and tense… almost like they were coming out to us. Abby made a joke about finding me a girlfriend, and I thought I brushed it off, but I guess she realized that something was off with me. When I was driving her home, she brought it up… and I really wanted to stop hiding, so I told her the truth.” I don’t tell him that she figured out our Breakfast Club excuse was a ruse. I don’t want to scare him, and I don’t want to open the whole can of worms of explaining that Abby knows I like him. He doesn’t even know I like him. And he never will. It’s just a really freaking inconvenient medley of feelings that I am committed to eradicating.

“That’s amazing,” Bram says breathlessly. “I never would have guessed from lunch today. How’d she take it?”

“Really great,” I admit. “I don’t know why I was so scared. She didn’t make it weird or make it an overly big deal.” Until she figured out about Bram. And then she was gushing about double dates and going to soccer games together. I didn’t have the heart to tell her that was never going to happen. “I think I’m going to tell Nick and Leah over break.” It should be so easy to bring up seeing him over break - I’d set myself up perfectly, but the words evade me. 

“Wow. That’s… wow.”

“Is that all you can say?” I ask.

“It might be,” he admits. “It’s just… last week, you said you weren’t ready for them to know. And now you’ve come out to someone. That’s a really big deal.” I think I detect a slight wistful look on his face, but it’s gone so quickly, I can’t be sure. “You should be so proud of yourself.”

“I am,” I tell him. “Which makes me feel really weird. Like, I didn’t save someone’s life or solve world hunger or anything like that. What do I really have to be proud of?”

“We were born into a world where it’s very hard to be ourselves. Speaking as someone that has yet to find the courage to come out, it takes a lot to be true to yourself. Despite that, you did it. I think that’s an awfully big accomplishment.”

His words make me feel warm. “Thanks.”

I think several minutes pass (it’s hard to tell with him). We both finally sit down and still, the comfortable silence prevails. It’s weird - I’ve never been one for silence. I think I mostly have experience with awkward silences, but sitting here with him is inexplicably nice. “How did you know you were ready?” he asks quietly.

I take his question very seriously because I can tell it took a lot for him to ask it. “I guess, it was almost like this perfect moment. Abby had just apologized and said that she hadn’t meant to upset me by bringing up girlfriends. I actually think she thought I’d been recently rejected.” I chuckle quietly, but I don’t actually think it’s funny. I definitely haven’t been rejected, but there’s something just as heartbreaking about liking someone you know doesn’t like you back. “She told me she just wanted me to be happy, and I realized, I believed her. It was like it stopped being a choice. I needed her to know.”

He looks thoughtful. “I wonder if that will ever happen for me.” Maybe he was wistful before. It’s weird to think of Bram as envious of anything that has to do with me.

“I think it will,” I reassure him. “I never thought the perfect moment would present itself, and I don’t think it did. I think I was ready, so I made the perfect moment. Does that even make sense?”

He frowns but nods. “Yeah, I think so. Especially that last part. I want to say screw it and get it over with, but… I can never do it. I think I’ve been waiting for that perfect moment instead of making it.”

“That’s okay,” I say softly. “When you’re ready, you’ll know. Maybe it won’t be until you have someone in your life that’s worth being open with, but it will happen.” The idea of Bram dating some random guy makes me so jealous that for a moment, that jealousy is all that exists. I hate that random guy with a burning passion.

Bram taps his fingers together. It’s a move I recognize. He does it all the time when he needs to talk about something that makes him uncomfortable. I guess he changes his mind because all he says is, “I hope so.”

“Who would you want your first to be?” And then because I’m worried that he’ll hear another meaning in my words, I clarify, “to come out to.”

He bites his lip. “I don’t know if I’d want it to be Garrett or my mom. On the one hand, Garrett is my best friend. He’s one of the only kids that tried to draw me out when I moved here, and he’s the only one that didn’t give up when I was reluctant. On the other hand, my mom is my everything. She worked so hard to build a life for us after she and my dad got divorced. I owe her everything I am.”

“Your mom sounds really great,” I observe. The way he talks about Garrett makes Garrett sound really great too, which is really strange because Garrett has always come across as a little bit of a douche. I still haven’t figured out how much of the douchey attitude is the result of Leah.

“She is,” he says affectionately. He hasn’t talked about his mom a ton. I think the only time he’s mentioned her was when he was talking about his dad. “Even when things were starting to go wrong between them, my mom was amazing. She made sure that she had a semi-okay relationship with my dad so I would still see them as a united front. She did the mom stuff and the dad stuff when I was younger. As I got older, I think we stopped knowing how to talk to each other, but I know how much she loves me.”

The confidence in his tone makes my heart ache in a completely different way. I’ve never felt that confidence with my parents. I know that, bare minimum, they’re going to turn me into the family project. I wonder why he hasn’t told his mom yet, but then a conversation from several weeks ago comes back to me. His mom is religious. “She is…” I frown. I could not remember what he called her. “Catholic?”

He shakes his head. “Episcopalian,” he corrects.

“Episcopalian,” I repeat. I have no idea what the difference between any of the religions is. I think my grandparents are Protestant, but they stopped arguing with my parents about church when I was too young to really remember it. “Do you think that’s going to affect how she takes it?”

“I don’t know. Hypothetically, Episcopalians are supposed to be gay-friendly, but I did the worst thing you can do when you’re thinking about coming out - I went on Google. There are horror stories of parents being okay with other kids being gay but can’t handle it when it’s their own kid. And a surprising number of parents that still think being gay is a choice. I can’t imagine my mom being one of those people, but you never really know,” he sighs. “Part of me thinks if I never come out then I never have to find out. At the same time, it’s kind of like you said. I’m really tired of hiding. Maybe I need to start making my perfect moments.”

The way he smiles makes me feel like that’s supposed to be a good thing or something but guilt burns through me. “I don’t want to pressure you into doing something you’re not ready to do,” I say nervously. “If me coming out to Abby makes you think that you have to - ”

He cuts me off. “It’s not that I have to. This isn’t a competition. I’ve wanted to for a while, but it seemed so out of reach,” he says. “I don’t think it's pressure; I think it’s inspiration. You were so brave yesterday, and I’m ready to be brave too.”

I duck my head. “I think that’s really great,” I tell him seriously.

There’s another long silence that stretches between us. This one isn’t quite as comfortable as earlier. I know why I’m tense - I’m thinking about break again and just how long two weeks will be. I don’t know why he’s so uncomfortable. Probably because he’s thinking about coming out.

“Look,” I finally say at the same time that he says, “hey.”

“You first,” I say.

“I was just going to ask you if Christmas was a big deal with your family.”

“Not really,” I tell him. “Christmas Eve is bigger for us. It’s when we do most of our traditions. Christmas is just presents and dinner, but Christmas Eve is magic. We decorate our tree, my mom makes reindeer turds, and we play a few games. Afterwards, we have french toast for dinner, but in a really classy way. Like, we eat off of their china and dim the lights. Then they watch Love, Actually. I don’t know. It usually feels like Christmas Eve is the real holiday and Christmas is just the after party.”

“I’m sorry. Your mom is making what?” he asks.

I can’t help my laugh. Nick and Leah know my family as well as they know me. They’re used to all of our quirks, but poor Bram has no idea. “Reindeer turds. They’re Oreo truffles, but my dad came up with the name and we always call them that around Christmas time. My mom makes the best truffles. Seriously. I’ll have to find a way to get them to you.”

Part of me is hoping that he’ll be the one to suggest hanging out over break, but he doesn’t. “That sounds really nice. Christmas is so formal with my family. I kind of wish we had some traditions just because.”

“What do you do for Christmas?” I ask curiously.

“We alternate where we spend it. It’s our turn to host, so my uncle and cousins will drive in and spend the night at my house. We go to a really long Christmas Eve mass, then another mass Christmas morning,” he explains. “When we do presents, we open them one at a time and watch while everyone opens theirs.” He shakes his head. “I’ve always hated that part. It makes me really self-conscious about how I react to my gifts. And it takes all day. We take a break for a late lunch slash early dinner, but other than that, it’s this silent, staring gift opening experience.”

“Wow. I’ve always assumed that everyone does gifts the way we do. Twenty minutes tops and all of our presents are open.” I know Bram doesn’t seem to like it, but it must be kind of nice to know people are actually interested in what you get. “That sounds intense.”

“It’s not even the worst part,” he says quietly.

“There’s more?” I ask. “What more can there possibly be?”

“When we finish opening our gifts, my uncle puts on a Santa hat and pulls out five envelopes - one for each of my cousins and me. Before my grandpa passed away, he set up a fund of sorts for the grandkids, so we all get a check from him every Christmas and every birthday.”

“I didn’t know about your grandpa,” I say quietly. I never know what to say to things like that.

He shrugs. “It happened a long time ago. I don’t talk about it much. My mom can’t really take it, and I think I just got into the habit of avoiding . We were living with him at the time, and I think she blames herself for not noticing he was sick earlier.”

“How’s your grandma doing?” I ask.

“I never met my grandma. She died when my mom was really little,” he explains.

I’m pretty sure my eyes are wide. I can’t imagine. “I’m sorry. That really sucks.”

“Yeah,” he agrees. “It’s especially hard around the holidays. My mom tries to pretend she’s okay, but it’s not the same without him. We all know that.” He chuckles without humor. “Do I know how to set the mood or what?”

“I asked,” I point out. “And I’m glad you told me.”

“I’m glad I talked about it too. And thanks for not thinking I’m weird.”

“I do think you’re weird, but I like weird,” I tell him. I don’t know if he realizes I’m using his line. He smiles in a way that makes me think he does remember. “Did you finish all your Christmas shopping? How many gifts do you have to get?”

“My uncle and his four kids,” he explains. “What about you?”

“My aunt is a nurse and has worked every Christmas since before I was born, so we do Christmas with my aunt, uncles, and cousins on New Year’s Eve,” I tell him. “We do a Secret Santa of sorts with them, so we don’t have to get twenty gifts for everyone. Outside of my parents and sisters, I only have to get gifts for my grandparents and one for my cousin. I actually have my cousin’s two-year-old this year, so my mom suggested some Paw Patrol toys. I can’t wait to see him open them.”

“I can’t believe you have a cousin old enough to have a kid,” he says quietly. “I don’t think I’ve ever even been around a baby before.”

“It’s still weird to me too, but she’s eleven years older than me,” I explain. “And her kid is at a really fun age. He doesn’t really like girls right now - I know the feeling. I’m not going to say I enjoyed it, but when we saw him for his birthday, he wanted nothing to do with Alice or Nora and it was hilarious.” He raises his eyebrows at me. “It’s not my fault. They were obnoxious about him when he was born. It was so freaking annoying.” I shake my head. “It doesn’t matter.”

“It obviously does. Why?”

I consider lying and telling him I’m not sure, but we don’t do that. He’s the one person I don’t have to pretend around. I shift a little on my desk. I’ve never found it uncomfortable before, but right now, I’m dying to walk around or something. I stand up, which is a little better. “I guess it bothered me because it spurred all these jokes about how they need the practice for when they have kids and how I’d learn from my wife one day. I knew I didn’t want that. I don’t even know if I want kids. I know it’s going to be a freaking process and what if I never meet someone that I can see myself having kids with? But more than that, what if I do? Are they going to think that me and my husband are going to screw up the parenting thing? And what if they’re not wrong?”

I don’t realize how fast I’m talking until I have to stop to breathe. I almost feel like I just ran a lap in gym class or finished a really intense dance for the play.

Bram is quiet as he processes everything I just said. I begin to pace while I wait for him to say something. “I don’t think anyone should be part of that decision except for you and your future husband.” His voice is incredibly soft, but his words are sharp. “Maybe you’ll suck at being a dad, but you’ll probably be great. And if you’re not, you’ll learn.” I can’t help my nervous chuckle. “But, seriously. I know we haven’t talked a ton about the future, but you deserve everything you want. If you want to be a dad one day, I think that’s great. If someone is going to think less of you as a parent just because you have a kid with two dads, that says a lot more about them than it does about you.” He sighs. “I think sometimes people forget that loving a child and being prepared to give them the whole world is more important than your gender.”

“Wow. I think I have goosebumps,” I tell him. I’m actually dangerously close to crying, and I guess I’ve inherited some of my dad’s make-jokes-in-tense-situations genes. The thought makes me cringe. I know how frustrating I find my dad’s jokes, and the last thing I want to do is make Bram feel like I’m not taking him seriously. “Thanks for all of that. It helped.”

“Anytime,” he says with a smile that makes my heart beat just a little too fast. “Not to change the subject, but Garrett will kill me if I’m late again. Before I leave, I wanted to give you something.” He reaches into his bag and pulls out an envelope. “Merry Christmas.” He gives me a quick hug and walks out of the classroom. It takes me over a minute to process that he’s actually left and I missed my opportunity to ask him about break. I look at the envelope. I can see that there’s a folded piece of paper and I can make out that there’s the indent of writing on the back of the page, but I have no clue what it says.

What could he have written that he couldn’t say to me in person? Is it a simple thank you for everything these last several weeks? Could it be a love note? Maybe I haven’t been building this up in my head. Maybe the things that I’ve thought were flirty were actually flirty. As soon as the thought enters my head, it’s gone. There would be actual signs if he was flirting. He’s just a really great listener and an even better friend. I put his note in my bag and decide that I’ll open it once I get home from the play tomorrow. It will give me some time to get over my disappointment that it's not a love note. I hate that I want it to be a love note. I hate it so much.

The next day before English, Bram drops a note on my lap as he passes me.

_ Can we have an emergency Breakfast Club meeting? _

I look over at him, and I have to do a double take. He’s a mess. He looks like he’s going to fall asleep at his desk and something just looks off with him.

**Of course. I’ll see you after school.**

I pretend to need a tissue and walk to grab one from the windowsill. I drop my answer on his desk on my way. I don’t know how subtle I am, but if anyone notices, they don’t say anything.

I feel really lucky that I sit behind Bram in Algebra because I spend almost the entire period studying him to make sure he’s okay. I don’t think Mr. Lowe has any actual expectations for us today. We’re supposed to take notes on  _ Hidden Figures _ , but I couldn’t actually tell you what’s happening in the movie. I’m sure it’s great and Mr. Lowe was really excited when he put it on, but I'm too distracted. Bram’s head nods forward a couple of times as if he almost fell asleep but jerked himself awake at the last minute.

Mr. Lowe isn’t in his classroom after school, but Bram is. He’s standing in the back. “I told Mr. Lowe that we were meeting for a minute to plan a study schedule for winter break,” he says quietly. “He already left.”

I shut the door as I walk in. “Cool,” I say. I drop my bag by my desk but don’t sit down. I stand next to Bram. “Is everything okay? You seemed off today.”

“I couldn’t sleep last night. I… I came out to my mom,” he tells me. He’s practically shaking.

“Oh my God. I’m so proud! How’d it go?” I ask eagerly.

“Really well. She didn’t bring religion into it at all like I thought she would. After everything we talked about yesterday and how you came out to Abby… It just felt like the right time,” he explains. He almost sounds a little breathless, but I can’t really blame him.

“I’m so freaking proud of you,” I tell him. I give him a hug. I hold on to him slightly longer than I should, but he doesn’t seem to notice, and it’s so freaking hard to let go of him. My hormones really need to check themselves because they’re making it harder and harder to be around him and not be blatantly obvious.

“Thanks,” he says quietly. He shakes his head. “I still can’t believe it. I didn’t sleep at all. I wanted to reach out to you last night, but I don’t have your number.”

“We’ve been meeting for a month and a half. Why haven’t we exchanged numbers yet?” I ask. “Here. Give me your phone. I’ll put my number in.”

He unlocks his phone and hands it to me. He has a weird look on his face, and I’m not sure if it’s because I’m giving him his number or for some other unknown reason. I debate putting my contact in as something cheesy, but I just label it Simon. I send myself a text and feel my phone vibrate when his message goes through.

“Sorry. So, tell me everything. Have I mentioned I’m proud of you?”

He grins big. “I think you said it once or twice,” he teases.

I stick my tongue out at him.

“Real mature,” he says. “I guess I shouldn’t expect anything else from you, huh?”

I roll my eyes. “I am perfectly mature, thank you very much,” I tell him.

“Yeah. And so is your cousin’s baby,” he tells me.

“Hey. I am definitely more mature than a baby. I speak words.”

Bram laughs. “You speak… words?” He takes deep breaths to calm himself down, but it doesn’t really seem to help. I’m pretty sure his hysterical laughter is 99% due to lack of sleep, but I’m still concerned.

“Are you okay?” I ask uncertainly.

He squats down for a minute to calm himself down. When he stands up, he puts his hand on my shoulder. “Never change. Please.”

I can’t explain what happens next.

He has this smile on his face that makes me feel like I’m melting, and his eyelids flutter a little. The simple motion has my heart beating in overdrive. I think my brain detaches from my body or something. It’s a combination of everything. His hand on my shoulder, the look on his face, the crush I’ve been trying to get over for weeks.

I don’t remember making the decision to do it, but I take a small step towards him to cross what little space was between us. I lean up to kiss him. He’s only a few inches taller than me, and he’s hunched over a little right now, so it’s easy to bridge that gap.

My eyes are open when I kiss him, but despite that, I have trouble processing anything I see. I had no freaking clue. I’m pretty sure we’re creating fireworks. We have to be. Creating explosions is the only thing that explains why I have yet to explode. Once I get over the initial feeling, I’m aware of the shock in his wide-open eyes.

I take a step back. I’m suddenly mortified. “I’m so freaking sorry,” I tell him. I turn so my back is to him. For weeks, I’ve been working to get over this crush. What was all that effort for if I was just going to do something stupid and kiss him?

“Simon,” he says softly. His voice sounds like he’s not getting enough air, and I’m so sure that he’s about to tell me that we can’t be friends if I like him. If he asks me, I don’t know if I can lie.

“Really. I shouldn’t have done that. Our friendship is really important to me. I don’t want to do anything to jeopardize it,” I ramble.

“Simon.” He puts his hand on my shoulder and turns me so I’m facing him. I still don’t look at him.

“It was just a dumb mistake. I promise it won’t happen again. I think I just got swept up in the moment or something. I don’t know. I’m so sorry if I made you uncomfortable.”

Maybe I should have looked at him. Because maybe it would have been less of a shock when he puts his hands on either side of my head and leans down to kiss me.

I remember to close my eyes this time, and we figure out our noses, so they’re not in the way. I grab the bottom of his shirt because it’s the only thing that proves to me that this is real; it’s the only thing that proves that this level of perfection is actually attainable. This is everything.

It’s so different from any of my other kisses. It leaves me wanting more. I didn’t even know it was possible for kissing to feel like this.

We’re both still for a moment after we break this kiss. I’m pretty sure I’m beaming. I can’t stop smiling. “That was unexpected.”

“Was it? I’ve been dropping hints for weeks,” he says quietly. “And I would have thought after I wrote you that note…”

“I didn’t read your note,” I admit. “I was going to read it tonight. You’ve been dropping hints? Really?” I think back over the last few weeks. There were a couple of times I thought he was flirting, but I mostly attributed that to my overactive imagination.

“I thought I was so obvious.” He looks down at the floor. “And I thought maybe you were flirting too.”

“Of course, I was,” I tell him seriously. “I just didn’t want to screw this up. I didn’t think you liked me. At least, not like that.”

“Now you know,” he says quietly.

“Where does this leave us?” I ask.

“What do you mean?”

“What are we? What happens now? Who do we tell?” I clarify. The idea of suddenly being out to everyone makes chills run down my back.

“That’s a lot of questions,” he says. “I think we tell whoever we want to tell. I’d like to tell my mom about you; if you’re okay with that. I know you’re not out to your family yet, and I don’t want to put any pressure on you.”

“So, if I’m still not ready?” I ask him slowly.

“Take as long as you need.” He grabs my hand. “I’m serious. You’re not going to lose me if you take your time and do this right. As long as it’s your intention to tell them at some point.”

“I’m going to tell them. And soon. I just want one more holiday before things change,” I tell him.

“That’s okay,” he assures me. I’m distracted because his thumb is rubbing circles into the back of my hand, and I don’t know how I’m supposed to concentrate on anything but that.

It takes me over a minute to refocus. “What about our friends? Abby knows and kind of knows about you… But Nick and Leah don’t know, and Garrett?”

“I think Garrett suspects,” Bram tells me. “I didn’t tell you sooner because I didn’t want you to think we couldn’t keep meeting and every time I almost told you that I like you, I couldn't do it. Garrett was really suspicious that we were the only two people in the Breakfast Club, and he’s made an uncomfortably large effort to tell me that he’s my friend no matter what.”

I file that away to think about later. It’s weird to think that Garrett might know, but Bram really seems to trust him, so I try to quell my nerves with that. “So, we’ll tell everyone else when we’re ready. And we’re both okay with that.”

“I promise,” he says. His thumb is moving in circles again and it’s really unfair because my brain seems unable to comprehend anything but that motion. But there’s something I feel like I need to say. 

“I really like you, but are you sure about this? You know that I’m a complete disaster,” I point out.

“You really need to read that note. Simon, everything you think makes you a disaster are the things that make you… you. I like all of those things, and I really like you too.”

I might never stop smiling. I slowly move my hand to the back of his neck. He doesn’t seem to mind. In fact, his eyes flutter closed a split second before I kiss him. This kid has seriously magical lips.

I jump back from him when I hear the sound of a chair moving across the floor. I hadn’t even heard the door open.

The same older janitor that interrupted our card game a few weeks ago is back. He is holding the small classroom trash can in one hand and is staring at us.

“Um… we were just leaving,” I manage to get out.

The janitor says nothing. I’m suddenly in a panic. Can we get in trouble for being in here? Will we get Mr. Lowe in trouble if we explain that he’s been letting us use his classroom unsupervised?

He nods once and takes off his headphones. “You shouldn’t be in here,” he says quietly. “You could get suspended if someone catches you.” Bram’s eyes are wide and if this wasn’t such a serious situation, I’m pretty sure I would have laughed at him. “I never saw you in here. You got that?”

I nod and look at Bram. I expect him to look relieved, but I think he’s in shock. “Why are you letting us go?” I ask the janitor.

“My son is gay. When he came out to me twenty years ago, I didn’t take it well. He told me how hard it was for him to tell me and that he wanted me to know that he was the same person, and I rejected that person.” A single tear slips down his cheek and it makes my chest burn as I try to fight my own tears. “He moved as far away from me as possible and it took me almost fifteen years to come to my senses. Fifteen years where I was cruel to anyone that reminded me of what I lost. Even after I’d apologized, the damage was done. He built a whole life without me. I missed the chance to see him fall in love and start his family. I missed my oldest grandchild’s first steps and first words. Every time I see him, I can still see the fear that I’ll be that same dad I was twenty years ago. I’ve done enough damage to your people. I won’t do any more. I never saw you here.”

He takes the bag out of the trash can, puts the trash can back in the corner, and leaves. I stare after him. That was unexpected. “I think we should go,” I whisper. “I forgot to tell Ms. Albright that I was going to be late to rehearsal today.”

Bram looks at me uncertainly. “I’m really sorry that we got caught. You’re obviously really upset and justifiably so, but I really think we ought to talk about it.”

“Upset?” I ask incredulously. “You think I’m upset? Didn’t you hear what he said?”

“That he wasn’t going to report us?”

“No. I mean yes, but I don’t particularly care about that. I’ve been thinking that coming out was either going to make or break me, but it doesn’t have to. Even if my family reacts in their typical way and even if my friends make it weird for a while, it doesn’t mean we’ll never move past it. What happens when I come out doesn’t have to be the final ruling, you know. People grow and change all the time.”

“Huh. So, you’re happy?” He confirms.

“I’m so freaking happy.” I kiss him again. 

When I get home from rehearsal, I immediately go to my room and read the note he wrote me. As I take in the words, I feel the biggest smile spreading across my face.

I know there’s still so much that needs to be done - I need to come out to my family and Nick and Leah. And we’ve got to tell everyone that we’re together and go through the whole awkward experience of finding out who can deal with us being gay. 

Our story is so new and unwritten, but I have hope that maybe one day, it will be long and beautiful. I really think I might be falling in love with this kid. 

_ Dear Simon, _

_ Perhaps it is cowardly to do this in a note instead of in person, but I keep trying to tell you this, and I can never find the words. When we first talked on either side of that divider wall, I never imagined that I would feel comfortable talking about how I feel. It seemed like there was an insurmountable barrier in between me and the rest of the world. In a single conversation, you broke down my barrier. You became someone that I could talk to about anything, and at some point, you became so much more than that. _

_ So here goes nothing. _

_ I really like you, Simon. As more than friends. I have for a long time - long before I even knew you were gay. I’ve always thought you were funny in a really innocent way. I like that you stare a little too much because it always made me feel special. I like how you talk in circles when you get nervous, how “freaking” is a large part of your vocabulary, and how you always look like you just rolled out of bed (don’t worry; I find it really cute). _

_ I needed to tell you in case there’s the smallest chance that you feel the same way or if there’s the slightest possibility that you might want to take a chance on me. _

_ If you don’t feel the same way, I absolutely understand. I’ve gone back and forth about whether it would be worth it to tell you, but if I’ve learned anything from all the times we’ve met, it’s that pushing myself out of my comfort zone has led to some of the most memorable moments of my life. _

_ Even if you don’t like me like that, I hope we can remain friends because you have become one of my best friends. _

_ Love, Bram _


End file.
